Update on my Cookbook & App

Most of you will be aware by now that the reason I have been so quiet on my blog and facebook page lately is because I have been madly working on my first cookbook and app. Very exciting!! It has been a huge learning curve for me and oh so much fun!

Some have been asking how it’s all going, so I thought I should fill you all in with an update and a sneak peek. Life gets so busy and for a long time it just wasn’t happening. My husband and I came up with the brilliant idea for him to take 6 weeks of his long service leave to give us a good head start on both the cookbook and app. I love having my own personal PA!! I could so get used to this and I love having him around everyday. Sadly Jimmy returns to work this week and the 6 weeks have already gone in the blink of an eye. Very grateful for the time we had and all the work we managed to slog out. Achieved so much, but there is still more to go.

Domestic Diva: Food photography Shoot 2

Domestic Diva:-Baked French Toast

It was so nice to have Jimmy around to take the kids to school and sports activities so I could get straight into cooking and setting up for photo shoots everyday. I have been teaching myself about food photography (I am not a photographer), lighting, food styling, and props. Each recipe is a long process of creating it, testing it multiple times, thinking about how to photograph it, setting up the photo shoot, cooking the dish, trying to make it look presentable on the plate (that is the hard bit!) then capture the right photo that makes the dish look look appealing that you are going to want to eat it.

Pinterest and the internet has taught me so much, and there is so much more to I have to learn. I am already planning recipes for book 2. Both books will be Thermomix failsafe cookbooks. There will be some recipes from my blog that have had a makeover as well as lots of new recipes for you. It has been wonderful to have Liz from Little Lush Cooks on board with some of her beautiful recipes.

I am very grateful for wonderful friends who so generously gave me photography lights, reflectors and a backdrop stand to borrow for the 6 weeks. Thank you so much Dan and Charein, you are such a blessing!

Domestic Diva: Food photography Shoot 1
Do you like my companion? Shiraz is our beautiful 18 year old cat that doesn’t leave my side.

Domestic Diva: Salad Dressings

So I would stay on track, I blue tacked to the wall a 6 week plan of what we wanted to achieve. Proud to say we mostly stuck to it. It was great to have in black and white what I had to remember to do each week and what groceries I needed to buy. The list on the very left was for the recipes to make and the ingredients required for each week. Then a calendar of our families weekly activities to work out what was best to cook on what day. Then a full list of every recipe we are putting in the book. It was such a joy to be able to put a highlighter line through each one as it was completed.

Domestic Diva: 6 week food photography planner

One thing I have loved about this project is visiting all the second hand shops for unique and perfect kitchen items to use as props for each photo. I didn’t fancy putting each dish on the same boring white plate for each photo and didn’t particularly want to spend a fortune on new items. Even better I can return them to the charity shops once I have finished with them. Jimmy jokes that we have spent our whole married life getting rid of all the odd bits and pieces we had when we first got married to invest in matching sets of everything and now we have returned to having odd sets and bits and pieces again, lol. Jimmy found some old timber pieces lying around under our house and made some back boards for me to use. I painted one in white, left one raw and stained another. I think they came up great in the photos.

Jimmy, my IT guru is the brains behind creating our Failsafe app. I will come along later and try to make it look pretty. This is also a huge task and lots of work to put together. When Jimmy wasn’t at my beck and call as my PA over the last 6 weeks, lol, he was working on building the app. The hard part now will be keeping up the momentum of working on it once he returns to work next week. We have lots of ideas on how we want it to work and do. I am sure you understand when I don’t want to give to many of our ideas away to have it copied from under us. The app is to make your life easier. In order to better serve you and have something that will meet your needs, we would love you to please take a moment to do our short survey below.

Thank you so much for your help, patience and understanding!

Rona. xx

 

A Quick Survey

Comments

  1. Claire Buchtmann says

    Thank you for all your hard work!

  2. Good on you for doing this, it will help newbies and old hands at Failsafe alike.

  3. Can’t wait!!!!

  4. Nicole Roy says

    I hope you will send me an e-mail went the app and cookbook is abalaible. Australia is ahead in the field of food allergies and intolerances .

    • Hi Nicole, I will be posting it on Facebook and my blog when they are released. If you have subscribed to my blog with your email address you will receive an email notification from me. 🙂

  5. Hi,

    I was wondering how your going with the app?

    Kind regards
    Mel

    • Hi Mel, we are still working on my book and app, progress has been much slower than I anticipated unfortunately with lots of family and medical dramas over the last 5 months that has been very consuming. I have not set a release date yet, but I am still working on it as much as possible to complete it.

  6. Hi, Just wondering if you have any idea when your cookbook will be released? I can’t wait 🙂

  7. Hoping your book will be on the way soon! 🙂

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